Ariadne(32)

I walked further out, away from the house. Now the sun was starting to burn away the mist and I looked around to try to get my bearings. In the west, night still held the island; the slumbering mountains were shapeless and blank in the darkness. Shading my eyes, I turned to the east and stepped cautiously towards the dawn, mindful of the uneven stones and my bare feet. I steadied myself against a rock and peered around it.

The vast ocean spread before me, breathing ripples of waves that swelled and surged to the beach some distance below. It had been a steep climb the previous day to the cottage and the rock that I leaned on jutted somewhat precariously over the edge of a long drop. The rising sun spilled orange light across the tops of the waves and, as I traced its path, I saw with disbelieving eyes a great ship sailing steadily along its course. The billowing black sails told me without question that it was Theseus’.

Had they left us? Had his men betrayed him? But why? Theseus was the heroic Prince of Athens and he had won them all glory. Why return without him?

But if his men had not left him . . . Could they have gone back to Crete for Phaedra? It seemed equally impossible that they would sail back there in the light of day and with no word to me. This furtive departure felt like something else. It made no sense and the creeping fear that I had felt since wakening took a deeper hold of me as the ship sailed farther on away from Naxos – not in the direction from which we had arrived, the way that would lead back to Crete with the rising sun in its wake but instead heading inexorably the opposite way.

Dry-mouthed, I sagged against the rock. Were it not for its solidity, I would have tumbled over the edge to the sea which foamed below. ‘Wait! Come back!’ My voice caught in my throat.

Did Theseus think I had followed him? I would see the ship change course any second as he realised I was not on board. I would see a rowing boat detach from the great bulk of the ship, with Theseus steering it back across the waves for me.

But how could he think I had followed? How would I have found my way to the shore alone and in the dark on this unfamiliar island?

I hadn’t been able to move for those long, frozen seconds, but now I darted around the rock in a sudden burst of frantic energy. The beach, I had to get to the beach. I had to call them back somehow, or maybe they had left a boat and I could follow. Sobs were twisting up from my chest as I scrambled along the cliff edge, searching for a path down, shouting after the impassive black sheets of canvas that swung in the wind and pulled Theseus away from me. I slid down the steep sides, stones tearing at my feet, until I reached the sand. Breathlessly, I staggered across its golden expanse. The ship had shrunk to a tiny dot, across an unimaginable stretch of sea. The sun was fully risen now, casting a rich light all around.

I looked about me in every direction, unable to comprehend what I saw. Emptiness. Bare sand. The remains of a fire some way down the beach, now just cold ashes. Panic clawed at my insides.

The black sails. The Athenian ship had set off from home bearing black sails as mourning for the doomed lives it bore across the waves. Aegeus had pleaded with Theseus to change them to white if he sailed home again, alive and victorious. The sails were still black. Could Theseus have died? Had he stumbled on the rocks, smashed open his head? Theseus, whom I had held in my arms, warm and living, just a few hours ago.

Which would be worse? That Theseus had died or that Theseus had left me? My knees gave way. The sand was rough and gritty against my bare skin, the fabric I clutched around me torn and stained from my scramble down the mountainside. I screamed as loudly as I could at the fading black dot, screamed until I could taste blood.

Why hadn’t he tied me to the back of the boat and drowned me in his wake? It would have been kinder than this cold, bloodless death. I would have preferred to thrash in the broiling waves, to see his face as he condemned me. But this – to creep away from me as I slept; to hasten to his ship and set forth without even time to change the sails and hoist the victory white in his eagerness to be away from me . . . My thoughts flailed helplessly.

I locked my arms around my knees to still their shaking. There must be an explanation – a different explanation. When I could stand, I would explore. I would find whatever sign they must have left, I would know the reason, and they would be back. Just as soon as I was able, I would get up and I would find out. But for the moment, I could only sit on the sand, holding myself together whilst I watched the ship vanish into the endless blue abyss of the sky, leaving me truly alone on Naxos.





12


I don’t know how many hours I spent staring out to sea as though I could conjure Theseus’ ship back into being. But at some point, I regained control over my stunned body and was able to stand. I still hoped, with a resolute fastness clenched deep within my belly, that I would find some kind of message – a reassurance that this desertion was temporary, and an end to it promised.

What I found quenched that burning anxiety within me with a torrent of icy water. The air sagged out of my lungs as I knelt to look at the neatly wrapped bundles nestled by the remnants of their fire. Salted meat. Cheese wrapped in leaves. A cask of water, some more of the wine that Theseus and I had drunk the night before. Olives. Bread. Supplies sufficient for perhaps five days, maybe six.

I had given Theseus the clue to the Labyrinth: fourteen lives of Athens and the death of my own brother. In exchange, he granted me perhaps a week to live in exile, imprisoned on a desolate island.

I rocked back on my heels, a whimper spilling from my raw throat. Through the pounding in my head, I thought I could hear the old, familiar sound of the drumming of hooves against rock. A spiral of corridors yawned open around me, sucking me into their foetid depths. I don’t know if it was the glaring heat of the sun, or the want of food and water since my lonely awakening, but I felt the gritty sand against my cheek as darkness swarmed up to engulf me and the blank relief of unconsciousness swept me under.